Puppy needing surgery - would you pay?

[Kijaji]

Our current situation is we have a 12 week old puppy who has a grade 4 heart murmur (picked up at 8 week vaccinations, was checked at birth and everything was fine), he’s awaiting further tests but worse case scenario it could cost us £5K to operate, if you had the money would you do it for a puppy you’ve only had 5 weeks but mostly everyone’s attached too and loves?

I’m slightly judging the 7 weeks, but my puppy had a heart murmur detected, fortunately we were also told they usually clear up, and it did- she’s a healthy 2 year old with no sign of it now

I would find the money to pay. But I’d let the breeder know first.i wouldn’t be able to give the puppy back. I appreciate your in the 14 day window with your own in insurance but did the breeder have any? One of mine came with 3 months petplan insurance so you may be able to claim on that

What do you mean, that MOSTLY everyone is attached to and loves?! You have bought a tiny, vulnerable, sentient puppy from a completely unscrupulous breeder, taken it away from its poor mother (who is no doubt just used as a breeding machine) far too soon, without doing any proper research - clearly you know very little about dogs. And now you’re asking strangers on the internet whether or not you should bother to cough up what’s needed to save its life - not even for the innocent puppy’s sake, but for the sake of some (?) of you who now feel attached to him/her?! This whole situation is heartbreaking and absolutely infuriating!!

Regarding your comment about vaccines - which country do you live in? In the UK all pups get the same main vaccines. Only Lepto vaccine can vary between different practices but this wouldn't stop them vaccinating. So if you are in the UK that is already a red flag from the breeder
And the cost of the 'surgery' - what heart disease do they suspect and does that cost cover all the diagnosis and aftercare too? Is he likely to need long term medication. Without knowing the type of heart disease or proposed surgery its impossible to know what the long term outcome is and surely this is important in deciding if it is financially possible to treat.

And terrible breeders like this one will continue to thrive because twits like the Op - who WANTS a cute dog but doesn’t have the budget for a decent breeder, so goes to a dodgy one.

This poor pup. I just hope the Op doesn’t dump roadside

Hmm……..I reckon this poor pup has been abandoned since the OP started this thread.

While I agree with previous posters on every point, I do have sympathy for the poster.
while it sounds as if this is an unethically bred pup it doesn’t mean that OP is an evil person.

maybe they had the four week breeder insurance then took out there own. Which would mean they wouldn’t be covered for first two weeks of taking out the policy.
I know I’m grasping at straws by looking for a sympathetic angle, but I’m doing so in the hope that OP might come back with more information.
The criminality comes with the breeders not the buyers.

BTW I have no skin in the game and did extensive research on our breeder, but it’s possible to be naive without being complicit in bad practice.

7 weeks is wayyyy too early! And the breeder normally always vaccinates puppies before they are rehomed and registers them with an insurer.

Our puppy had to have life-saving surgery at 10 weeks due to a freak accident and of course we did it!! He was our baby. In fact, I felt like I was taking my baby in for surgery - I was in floods of tears and on the phone to the vet practice non-stop for updates whilst he was in the theatre. He's now a 5-year-old boy and the surgery is long-forgotten.

That's not true for all breeds.

With Labradors it is usual to be collected at 8 weeks old and that is the case with very reputable breeders. Though I've never heard of a breed where puppies should leave before 8 weeks old.

Poor, poor puppy.

What an awful situation. I'd wait for the further tests and see what that throws up, then decide.

I get that puppy farms are disgustingly and it's clear this breeder is an absolute shit, but please- the poster seems in some distress and is in an awful situation for her family. I hope the murmur resolves as others have said.

we paid £4k for our little cat to have an Op.

I was mentally unwell at the time and my husabnd is not capable of doing any life admin so he didn't sort out pet insurance - no idea why but obvs had been too dependent n me

Do you know it isn’t obligatory to insure a pet? We don’t insure ours.

In this case the OP does have it but so what if she didn’t? You managed to being judgemental and patronising an just four words, and offered no help whatsoever.

Fair point.
you and I know that but it’s possible that op didn’t know this.
as I said, I’m just trying to allow the OP to come back.
we got a puppy three years ago at eight and a half weeks and my Mum was astonished that we let puppies go so young.
the last time she had a puppy it was as twelve weeks.
ad I said I’m absolutely not defending the OP.
I think we’d all be interested why they made the decision they made.
Far more helpful than piling on labelling them as irresponsible.
they are asking for advice on their current situation.
I would like them to come back and answer questions.
particularly what they see as an alternative to not having pup treated.
But a pile on is not helping

This ! I’m guessing poor pup will be left to die as she won’t be paying 😢

The Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (England) Regulations 2018 was amended in 2020, known as Lucy's law.

• It's illegal to sell a puppy under 6 months unless you are a licensed breeder and you bred the puppy
• It's illegal to sell a puppy under 8 weeks old
• A good breeder would have taken out the (free!!) puppy insurance with Petplan or similar, and if the new owner continues it then all conditions are covered from the point of ownership and the 2 week exclusion doesn't apply.

You have bought a backyard bred dog.

I don't know if I would pay £5,000. Morally, yes, but the reality is that a lot of people wouldn't have it and wouldn't be able to get it.

In future, red flags:

• Allowing you to take the puppy before 8 weeks
• Giving you an uninsured puppy
• No puppy contract

In October 2018 the government in England introduced a new law about certain activities involving animals which is called the The Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (England) Regulations 2018.

Some of the conditions included in the new law are that:

• Breeders can only sell puppies they have bred themselves, and only from the place the puppy was bred and reared.
• Puppies must be 8 weeks before they can be sold or leave their mum.
• Puppies must be seen with their biological mum.
• All dogs for sale must be in good health.

Does the breeder have insurance that would cover it? Why did they sell it when so young?

The vaccination issue can be tricky. With our first lab I asked the breeder not to vaccinate because she was 3 hours drive from us and they used Lepto2 in their area and we used Lepto4 in ours (lots of collections of water), which isn't compatible. So I arranged the vaccinations prior to pick up date, so that she was vaccinated the day of collection at our own vet. She still had the vet's health check as normal.

Our second lab, the breeder used Canigen which is compatible with Nobivac, so I arranged second vacs with her vet because they were fairly local and then switched to our vets from then on.

So lack of vaccinations isn't a red flag itself, as long as there has been a discussion about what's best for the puppy and the owners have arranged suitable cover.

Get a 0% credit card and pay half out of your own money and half on the card to keep down the monthly repayments. But you need to dig down into exactly what grade of heart murmur the pup has.

This.
And yes of course i would pay not that I would be in this unfathomable situation in the first place. I don't buy dogs who are over bred to the point of not being able to give birth, I don't go to dodgy breeders and I would report any breeder giving away dogs at 7 bloody weeks not that it would do any bloody good because nobody cares .

What's the alternative? Have the poor thing pts and get another one because It's cheaper, I assume.

Pps are right that he may not need an op though.

Get a second and third opinion.

Fwiw my dog isnt insured. But I have money and means of getting it if for some reason I don't.

I agree 0% credit card although my cynicism notes not everyone can access these for various reasons.

The lack of accountability and responsibility in so many adults now makes me glad I am on my way out of this world rather than in.

This is an awful situation. I have had dogs for years . No way should this poor puppy have been sold to you at such a young age. Have you contacted the breeder to let them know the issue? Morally yes you should pay it,but let's be realistic, a stage 4 heart murmur at 7 weeks old will not be the only thing. Things will be picked up throughout its life more than likely and insurance wont cover it because they'll try and link any issues back to the heart murmur. I would in all honesty give the puppy back and report the breeder. The dog will likely cost you more money down the line and once time has passed you'll be even more attached to it . Give it back as soon as possible and next time do some due diligence beforehand